Piston engines pay a high price of energy lost to reciprocal motion. A piston accelerates, de-accelerates, stops and reverses direction with each stroke. The efficiency of piston compressors and combustion engines would be ideally enhanced if the momentum of machine mass and gas flow could be conserved. However, pistons reverse direction to define each stroke or cycle. Compressors reverse 2 times, engines reverse 4 times, to deliver a single power stroke. And it is this change of direction and velocity that nullifies the energy inherent to momentum. The inability to maintain momentum, CONSTANT velocity and direction, is expensive. The mechanical apparatus required to convert that linear motion into usable rotary motion using rods and crankshaft and the energy loss is substantial. Some patents have been issued for rotary type engines exemplary examples are presented herein.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,250,279 issued to Steven Zack on Jun. 26, 2001 discloses a Rotary Internal Combustion Engine using a series of annular surfaces with disk shaped pistons and an urging means to push the disks to the outer surface of the engine block. While this invention uses a rotary type engine there is still motion that pushes the disks towards and away from the engine block. This results in wasted energy and vibration. In addition the disks are maintained in position with springs that the explosion from the gas can overcome thereby creating an inefficient loss of power that is not present in the pending design.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,530,357 issued to Viktor Prokoflevich Yaroshenko on Mar. 11, 2003 discloses a Rotary Internal Combustion Engine using a hexagonal internal piston within an octagonal motor block where four sides of the motor block provide fuel/air mixture as well as exhaust. The remaining four sides provide sealing surfaces. While this patent provides a motor with rotary motion, the sealing surfaces move in and out thereby creating inefficiency and vibration.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,978,758 issued to Brent Warren Elmer on Dec. 27, 2005 discloses a High Efficiency Rotary Piston Combustion Engine. This engine operates similar to a turbine engine where air is compressed into the centrifugal cylinders where a spark plug ignites an air fuel mixture that turns the turbine to bring more compressed air into the motor. While this motor operates without any reciprocal motion the ignition of the gas does not take place in an enclosed chamber and some of the burned gas can escape back though the air intake system.
Published U.S. Patent Application US 2002/0023597 to Jorma Lillbaka, published on Feb. 28, 2002 discloses a valve less engine there the pistons rotate around an outer ring. The outer ring has holes that align with the top of the piston head. When the holes align the holes provide either intake exhaust functions to drive the piston(s). This application also requires the oscillating motion of the piston. The only advantage is the elimination of valves and the associated valve drive mechanism that is replaced with a rotary ring going around the piston(s).
What is needed is a motor design that uses intersection rings where the rings provide intake and exhaust function to fill the combustion chamber. The ideal motor would operate equally well as an air pump operating with similarly designed intersecting rings. The proposed rotary combustion engine provides this solution by taking the design of a conventional four stroke piston driven motor and bending the pistons and cylinder into a circular ring. The function of opening and closing the valves is accomplished by rings with slots that engage into the circular ring to open windows for these functions without using valves the move in and out.